Today's Obsession: The Digital Earth

Japan’s National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation displayed this pretty pretty thing—it’s the world’s first spherical organic LED display, made by Mitsubishi Electric. The sphere itself is made up of about 10,000 little OLEDs. (My boyfriend’s first remark upon seeing it was, “that’s expensive.”)

The display of information is the cool thing, though. In this case, they’ve mapped the Earth onto the thing with satellite information such as tidal motion and weather patterns showing. Combine that with an intimate scale, and you get a breathtaking display of information showing the planet in a way many can’t comprehend.